“With the choice of Naval Group, two naval yards didn’t win and I understand that the disappointment is large,” state secretary for defence Christophe van der Maat said after Naval Group was chosen over Germany’s Thyssenkrupp Marine Systems (TKMS) and Sweden’s Saab AB, which works in tandem with the Dutch Damen Shipyards. 

The Dutch chief of Defence, General Onno Eichelsheim, confirmed on social media that the four new submarines would be built by Naval Group.

“The ships offer increased striking power and improved operational capacity, and will be deployable for different types of missions globally,” he posted.

‘Large capacity’

According to a factsheet from the Dutch Ministry of Defence, the new submarines will have a “large capacity thanks to modern battery technology”.

The torpedoes and cruise missiles have a longer range than those of the older ships, conditions for special forces operations are improved while there’s a “reduced chance at detection” of the ship, the document says.

According to the Ministry of Defence, two ships will be delivered within ten years “after the contract has been negotiated”.

It points to the complexity of the systems: one submarine contains a million parts, while a fighter jet has only 35,000 parts and a “family car just about 3,000”. 

Core tasks for the vessels are “strategic influencing” (influencing behaviour of potential enemies with limited military means) and “special forces operations” (eliminating strategic targets or infrastructure, collecting intelligence and preparing follow-up operations).

The subs will carry an unspecified number of torpedoes and cruise missiles. The principle task will be to “collect, analyse and disseminate intelligence”. 

Finally, says the factsheet, it is the “best boat for the best price” – estimates range from 4 to 6 billion euros, or 1 to 1.5 billion euros per ship. 

Fierce debate

The government decision was preceded, last Wednesday, by a debate in the Dutch parliament. The debate was initiated after news that the order was to go to a French company was leaked in the press, triggering anger that the deal didn’t go to Dutch companies.

MP Chris Stoffer, whose SGP party is strong in Zeeland province where Naval Group’s competitor Damen is based, called the debate. He said: “We do not let this government decide, but a new government that will decide in the interests of the Netherlands.”

• Dutch government to decide on the purchase of four French submarines

But the debate was premature, as the government will officially provide parliament with a “technical briefing” on 27 March, which will be limited to information that does not fall under the military secrets act.

This will be followed by a new debate, where parliament can still veto the decision. According to Defence Secretary van der Maat, the final contract must be signed in July as the offers proposed by the different competitors “will expire”. 

The submarines will perform tasks in that conform to the Dutch 2019 National Defence Doctrine, which warns that “the increased assertiveness of state actors such as China and Russia” brought about a strategic shift from NATO.

“One consequence of this for the Dutch armed forces is a renewed focus on the first main task, for instance through participation by the Dutch armed forces in an enhanced Forward Presence within NATO territory,” according to the doctrine. 

Ursula von der Leyen travels with the Prime Ministers of Italy, Belgium and Greece, Giorgia Meloni, Alexander De Croo and Kyriakos Mītsotakīs, to “to advance negotiations” with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi regarding the signing of an EU-Egypt Strategic Partnership.

The groundwork for visit was laid out in Brussels during the 10th Association Council meeting between the two sides in January. Then, EU Commissioner for Enlargement, Oliver Várhelyi, expressed optimism that the agreement would be finalised by the end of February.

The collaborative approach mirrors the Team Europe strategy employed last summer, when Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte joined von der Leyen and Meloni in persuading Tunisian President Kais Saied to sign the EU-Tunisia Memorandum of Understanding [MoU.]

• EU offers Tunisia massive aid deal to reduce migration and boost economy

However, that deal was blasted by international human rights organisations and some MEPs who criticised Brussels for forming an anti-migration partnership with Tunisian President Kais Saied‘s increasingly authoritarian regime.

At the time, European Ombudsman Emily O’Reilly remarked that “where fundamental rights are not respected, there cannot be good administration,” saying that “von der Leyen’s European Commission has some explaining to do. 

“Did the Commission carry out a human rights impact assessment of the MoU before its conclusion and consider possible measures to mitigate risks of human rights violations?,” the ombudsman asked, in a letter to von der Leyen.

In an intial reply, the Commission answered that it will “continue to monitor the respect for human rights through its financing cooperation in Tunisia through the applicable rules and procedures under the NDICI-Global instrument and other EU rules.”

According to the website of the EU ombudsman, the inquiriy into EU practices regarding the respect of human rights in the deal with Tunisia is still “ongoing.” 

9 million migrants

Meanwhile, the EU-Egypt partnership will be structured around six key areas of “mutual interest,” as outlined by Egypt’s foreign minister, Sameh Shoukry, on January 23. They include political relations, economic stability, investment and trade, migration and mobility, security and demography, and notably, energy cooperation.

And while the memorandum with Tunisia focuses on border management and migration cooperation, the dealwith Egypt will be broader.

The country currently hosts a staggering 9 million migrants, causing immediate pressure on the economic environment of the country.

The EU acknowledges Egypt’s “significant potential” in green electricity, which Brussels is particularly interested in alongside the country’s vast energy resources, including gas and renewable energy.

According to Victoria Rietig, Head of the Migration Program of the German Council of Foreign Relations, writing on X, the EU is “set to give 7.4bn euros to invest in Egypt’s economy, energy sector, and migration and border management.

As in the agreement with Tunisia of  23 July, migration is one element among others.

“While 7.4 billion euros is a lot,” she says, “it’s peanuts compared to another investment Egypt received recently: 35 billion from the UAE for a huge infrastructure project along the Mediterranean coastline. An 8 billion loan from the IMF, also agreed this month, comes on top of all that.

Authoritarian system

But some argue, she says, that since “Egypt is an authoritarian system, abuses human rights, oppresses its people, and treats migrants poorly, Europe should not partner with el-Sisi for migrant control deals.

“Why make us dependent on such a regime?

“Egypt is an authoritarian system, abuses human rights, oppresses its people, and treats migrants poorly. Europe should not partner with El-Sisi for migrant control deals, some argue. Still cooperation may be interesting because Cairo is effective.

“Few boats leave the Egyptian coast irregularly. The EU and Egypt have expanded their migration cooperation successively in recent years.”

On top of that the EU “wants a stable Egypt in an unstable region. The alternative to engaging financially risks leaving even bigger geopolitical openings for Gulf countries, Russia, and China.” 

Moreover, Egypt has become a “regional refugee host in its own right. There are half a million refugees and asylum seekers currently registered in the country, according to UNHCR data, most of them from Sudan (280k) and Syria (155k),” she says.

Riesing argues that the quality of the agreement all “depends on the implementation. It should include human rights safeguards in Egypt’s border management.

Funds are, a least in part,  go to civil society and international organisations that provide refugee and migrant services in Egypt (instead of directly to the regime),” she says. 

(with newswires)

Friday’s tripartite summit in Berlin comes on the heels of a meeting between US President Joe Biden and Polish leaders in Washington, shortly after Biden announced an emergency stopgap package for Ukraine.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said it was of great importance that the three countries of the so-called Weimar Triangle meet to discuss the war in Ukraine.

Speaking at a press conference earlier this week, Scholz said: “We must do everything we can to organise as much support as possible for Ukraine.”

Scholz stressed that the “Weimar Triangle” – a diplomatic format for French, German and Polish cooperation established in 1991 – was an important format for political exchange.

Poland, one of Ukraine’s staunchest allies, has repeatedly urged its Western partners to increase their spending on military aid as Kyiv fends off Russia’s invasion.

• Ukraine’s allies must ‘jump-start’ their support, Macron tells Paris summit

Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk told state broadcaster TVP late Tuesday from Washington: “In my opinion, these three capitals have the task and the power to mobilise all of Europe” to provide Ukraine with fresh aid.

Relations between the allies have been strained by Germany’s refusal to send long-range Taurus missiles to Ukraine, despite urgent calls from Kyiv.

The issue has been a particular source of tension between Scholz and the France’s president Emmanuel Macron, who has pointedly urged allies not to be “cowards” in supporting Ukraine. 

Taurus missiles

The German and French leaders are scheduled to hold a bilateral meeting in Berlin before the three-way summit with Tusk.

Scholz and Macron have reportedly “talked to each other at length on the phone” in recent days and Scholz himself is keen to dispel any notion of a rift with Macron.

“Emmanuel Macron and I have a very good personal relationship,” Scholz told reporters, adding that he placed great value on the “German-Franco friendship“.

• French defence minister plays down Macron’s remarks on Ukraine deployment

The chancellor has not, however, changed his position on the delivery of Taurus missiles, arguing that the deployment of long-range missiles would involve German soldiers directly in the conflict and therefore risk an escalation.

The issue centres on “where will be targeted … where will be hit”, Scholz said in the German parliament earlier on Wednesday.

“That should not happen with German soldiers,” Scholz added. “I have the responsibility to prevent Germany from becoming involved in this war.”

Macron caused controversy last month after he said he could not rule out the deployment of ground troops in Ukraine in the future, with many leaders distancing themselves from that while others, especially in eastern Europe, expressed support.

“If Russia wins this war, Europe’s credibility will be reduced to zero,” Macron said in a television interview mostly directed at a domestic audience, after French opposition leaders criticised his comments as bellicose.

‘Deeply’ disagrees

Macron said he “deeply” disagrees with the opposition leaders. “Today, deciding to abstain or vote against support to Ukraine, it’s not choosing peace, it’s choosing defeat. It’s different,” he said.

He said it was important for Europe not to draw red lines, which would signal weakness to the Kremlin and encourage it to push on with its invasion of Ukraine. He refused to give details on what a deployment to Ukraine might look like.

“I don’t want to do so. I want Russia to stop this war and retreat from its positions and allow peace,” he said. “I’m not going to give visibility to someone who is not giving me any. This is a question for President Putin.”

“I have reasons not to be precise,” he said.

Paris not at war

Macron said France would never initiate an offensive against Russia, and that Paris was not at war with Moscow, despite the fact that Russia had launched aggressive attacks against French interests in and outside France.

“The Kremlin regime is an adversary,” he said, declining to call Russia an enemy. He also said Putin making threats about nuclear strikes was “not appropriate”.

Macron said Ukraine was in a “difficult” situation on the ground and that stronger support from allies was necessary.

“Peace does not mean the capitulation of Ukraine,” he said. “Wanting peace does not mean defeat. Wanting peace does not mean dropping Ukraine,” he said.

He also said he hoped that the time would come one day to negotiate peace with a Russian president “whoever it might be”, for the first time envisaging the possibility of Putin no longer being in charge in Russia.

Macron also said he had not cancelled a planned visit to Ukraine for security reasons. “That’s what Russia said. You shouldn’t believe them,” he said.

(with Reuters)

Cottin will host the opening and closing ceremonies of the festival, which takes place on the French Riviera from 14 – 25 May.

The 45-year-old comedian first came to the attention of French audiences with her provocative stand-up character Connasse (Bitch).

Her role as a high-energy, cynical artistic agent in the French series Dix pour cent adapted in English by Netflix (Call my Agent) opened the doors to Hollywood, where she has made several films.

She went on to star in Ridley Scott’s House of Gucci, alongside Matt Damon in Stillwater and was in a biopic about former Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir (Golda).

She also recently appeared alongside Jean Dujardin and George Clooney in an ad for Nespresso coffee capsules.

In France, her latest film Toni en famille sees her play the role of a mother raising her five children alone, juggling a full-time job and singing in bars in the evening.

Big names expected in line-up

France Télévisions and Brut, official partners of the Cannes Film Festival, will once again broadcast the opening and closing ceremonies this year.

This year’s festival has already appointed the head of its jury: Barbie director Greta Gerwig.

Quebec director Xavier Dolan will chair the jury for the Un Certain Regard prize.

• American director Greta Gerwig chosen as jury president for 2024 Cannes Festival

• From Cannes to the Oscars, French director Justine Triet’s road to glory

The main competition jury will pick a successor to Anatomy of a Fall, which won last year’s Palme d’Or and went on to win the Oscar for best original screenplay last week for writer-director Justine Triet.

Several big names in cinema are rumoured to be among this year’s entries.

There is the highly anticipated new project from directing legend Francis Ford Coppola, Megalopolis, starring Adam Driver and Forest Whitaker.

There’s also the adaptation of Limonov by Emmanuel Carrère by the Russian director Kirill Serebrennikov, a musical comedy by Jacques Audiard in the world of drug trafficking in Mexico and possibly Emmanuelle, signed Audrey Diwan.

The festival line-up is due to be announced on 11 April.

(with AFP)

Their release – which was announced on state channel RTS  on Thursday night – follows weeks of crisis after President Macky Sall postponed the scheduled presidential poll on 25 February.

Sonko, who is expected to return home on Friday afternoon, has emerged as one of Sall’s main opponents since coming third in the 2019 presidential election.

But after he was disqualified from running in the 2024 poll he then endorsed Faye to replace him on the ballot even though he had also been in prison since April 2023.

Rumours

As rumours of the men’s release began to circulate on social media, crowds took to the streets of the capital to celebrate.

Cars and pedestrians waving Senegalese flags gathered at the prison where the two men had been detained.

“We love Sonko”, they chanted.

“It’s a joy. It’s incredible. They released Ousmane Sonko,” said 31-year-old Mamadou Mballo Mane.

Their liberation comes after 62-year-old Sall proposed a bill granting amnesty for acts committed in connection with political demonstrations since 2021.

End

Sall, who has ruled in Senegal since April 2012, is not standing for re-election. His sudden decision to defer the February presidential vote sparked clashes that left four dead.

A new date was finally set for 24 March after a month of political crisis.

Bouts of unrest since 2021 have led to dozens of deaths and hundreds of arrests in a country often viewed as a bastion of stability in western Africa where several other countries such as Guinea, Burkina Faso and Mali undergone military coups.

Sonko has always maintained there was a plot to keep him out of the 2024 election, while his camp and the government have traded blame for the violence.

He was sentenced twice in 2023 for defaming a minister and for corrupting a minor and had been in prison since the summer on a string of other charges, including provoking insurrection, conspiracy with terrorist groups and endangering state security.

Just hours after the men’s release Senegal’s Supreme Court rejected a bid by one of the main opposition parties to halt the poll on 24 March.

The Democratic Party of Senegal (PDS) filed an urgent motion to freeze electoral procedures earlier this month, citing irregularities and alleged corruption it claimedhad  led to the elimination of their candidate Karim Wade.

Announcing the verdict, the judges declared the demand unfounded and said the Constitutional Council – the body that approves presidential candidates – had the legal authority to make the decisions it took.

PSG – who are led by the former Barcelona boss Luis Enrique – lost in the 2020 final to Bayern Munich and have not featured in the quarter-finals of European club football’s most prestigious competition since 2021 when then coach Mauricio Pochettino steered them to the semi-finals where they lost to Manchester City.

City lost the final to Chelsea but Pep Guardiola’s side claimed the title for the first time in 2023 when they overcame Inter Milan. 

Guardiola’s charges will continue the defence of the crown against 14-time champions Real Madrid who they pulverized in their surge to glory last season.

“We don’t have another option,” said Guardiola. “It seems like tradition, three years in a row, to play the kings of the competition.”

Atletico Madrid, who dispatched Inter in the last-16, will take on Borussia Dortmund while the Premier League leaders Arsenal face Bayern Munich.

The tie will mean a first competitive return to England for the former Tottenham Hotspur striker Harry Kane.

The draw at the headquarters of tournament organisers Uefa in the Swiss city of Nyon also matched the teams for the semi-finals.

Should PSG emerge from the clash with Barcelona – who famously beat them 6-5 on aggregate after losing the first leg 4-0 – they will face Atletico Madrid or Dortmund.

The first leg of the quarter-finals will take place on 9 and 10 April. The return games will be played a week later.

In the second tier Europa League, Marseille, who are enjoying a resurgence in form following the appointment of the former Cote d’Ivoire boss Jean-Louis Gasset, will take on Benfica.

Title favourites Liverpool and Bayer Leverkusen will play Atalanta and West Ham respectively while Milan will battle with Serie A rivals Roma.

Whoever wins that tie will meet Bayer Leverkusen or West Ham in the semi-final. Liverpool or Atalanta will await Marseille or Benfica.

Should Lille eclipse Aston Villa to reach the last four of the Europa Conference League, they will play Olympiacos or Fenerbahce

The other quarter-finals pit Viktoria Plzen against Fiorentina and Club Brugge against PAOK.

Since the 7 October attacks, the Israel-Hamas conflict has caused mass civilian deaths, reduced vast areas to a rubble-strewn wasteland and sparked warnings of a looming famine in the Palestinian territory of 2.4 million people.

On Tuesday, a Spanish charity vessel – the Open Arms – was on its way to Gaza from Cyprus, where it had set sail towing a barge with 200 tonnes of aid, in a first voyage meant to open a maritime corridor.

The flow of aid trucks from Egypt into Gaza has slowed recently – a trend blamed both on Israeli security checks of cargo and civil unrest in Gaza where desperate crowds have looted aid shipments.

• France calls for independent probe into Gaza aid delivery deaths

About half a dozen Arab and western nations have airdropped food parcels by parachute into Gaza, and Morocco has sent a planeload of relief supplies via Israel’s Ben Gurion airport.

The UN World Food Programme – trying an alternative land route from southern Israel – sent six aid trucks into northern Gaza on Tuesday, through a gate in the security fence.

The WFP reported it had “delivered enough food for 25,000 people” and demanded that, with people in northern Gaza on the brink of famine, they need deliveries every day: “We need entry points directly into the north.”

‘Man-made’ famine

This comes as the European Union’s foreign affairs chief Josep Borrell told the UN Security Council on Tuesday that the humanitarian crisis in Gaza “is man-made”.

“If we look at alternative ways to provide support, it’s because the land crossings have been artificially closed,” he said, charging that “starvation is being used as a weapon of war“.

Gaza’s food shortages after more than five months of war have killed 27 people through malnutrition and dehydration, most of them children.

Aid agencies have warned that truck deliveries and airdrops have fallen far short of meeting the desperate needs of the population, as European nations and the United States have announced plans to send more relief goods by sea.

• Thousands of patients need to be evacuated from Gaza, WHO says

Maritime corridor

Last week, US President Joe Biden announced plans for the military to build a pier on Gaza’s coast, and four US Army vessels left a base in Virginia on Tuesday carrying about 100 soldiers and equipment.

Spain’s Open Arms vessel is continuing the 400 kilometre journey across the Mediterranean Sea to Gaza, where US charity World Central Kitchen said work was underway to build a makeshift jetty.

Cypriot Foreign Minister Constantinos Kombos said Tuesday that “if all goes according to plan … we have already put in place the mechanism for a second and much bigger cargo”.

“And then we’ll be working towards making this a more systematic exercise with increased volumes.”

‘War on children’

The Gaza war was sparked by the 7 October Hamas attacks that resulted in about 1,160 deaths in Israel, mostly civilians.

Weeks of talks involving US, Qatari and Egyptian mediators had aimed to bring a truce and hostage release deal before the start of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, but missed the deadline on Monday.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has doubled down on his pledge to “destroy Hamas” – including by sending troops into Gaza’s last area so far spared ground operations, far-southern Rafah.

The prospect of a Rafah invasion has sparked global alarm because it is crowded with almost 1.5 million people displaced by the war, many sheltering in camps of makeshift tents.

Philippe Lazzarini, head of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees, called for an immediate ceasefire and branded the conflict “a war on children”.

The legal definition of rape in France includes the notions of “violence, coercion, threat or surprise”, but makes no mention of “consent”.

Women’s rights advocates have called for the law to be tightened by including the concept so that all sex without consent is rape, adding that only a tiny fraction of rapes or attempted rapes lead to a conviction.

• EU agrees first law on violence against women, fails to find consensus on rape

On 8 March, Macron told a women’s rights group: “I totally understand that consent should be enshrined” in the law. 

“I will inscribe it in French law,” he added in a video filmed by women’s rights group’s Choisir – La Cause des Femmes (Choose – The Women’s Cause), a full version of which seen by French media on Wednesday.

A group of lawmakers is working on a report on whether to add consent to the law that they are to present mid-April.

“It’s good news for women’s rights,” one of them, Greens lawmaker Marie-Charlotte Garin, said after Macron’s remarks.

France rejects ‘consent’ in EU legislation

However, France was one of several countries to argue against including a consent-based definition of rape in an EU law passed last month.

The states in opposition argued that rape does not have the cross-border dimension necessary for it to be considered a crime that comes with common penalties across the European Union.

Macron is filmed in the video saying that he did not believe rape was a “eurocrime”, but did want to change French law.

• France makes abortion constitution right as world fetes Women’s Day

Constitutional amendment

In 2023, the president promised to have the freedom to resort to an abortion added to France’s constitution after the US Supreme court overturned the half-century-old nationwide right to the procedure in 2022.

Earlier this month, French parliament gave a green light to the constitutional amendment in a historic vote, making France the first country to clearly give the right such protection in its basic law.

Macron has now pledged to enshrine the right in Europe’s basic law.

Last year, Spain approved a new legislation, dubbed the “Only yes means yes” law, under which all non-consensual sex is rape.

Sweden, Greece, Denmark and Finland have also passed similar laws.

Fouteau, 49 is now the president and editor-in-chief of Mediapart replacing its co-founder, Plenel, aged 71.

“This long-prepared step is taken in accordance with our values, which always put collective intelligence above personal adventures,” she said in a text posted on the site.

Plenel, was director of Le Monde‘s editorial team from 1996 to 2004 and an emblematic figure of investigative journalism in France.

He co-founded Mediapart in 2008 with François Bonnet, Laurent Mauduit, and Marie-Hélène Smiejan.

In February, Plenel, the last of the co-founders still on the management team, announced that he would step down as president but said he would continue to write.

All four four main leadership positions at Mediapart are now held by women: Fouteau, Cécile Sourd (general manager since 2023), Lenaïg Bredoux and Valentine Oberti (editorial directors since 2023).

Fouteau has worked for Mediapart since the founding of the publication. Previously she worked for the economic daily Les Echos after it was taken over by the luxury group LVMH.

Before taking the helm of the investigative site, she worked on migration issues and was co-editorial director from 2018 to 2023.

“Our project is to make Mediapart a major popular newspaper, which both disturbs and unites, through the strength and quality of its information,” she said.

• Françoise Giroud, a woman to be reckoned with in French media and politics
• Press freedom ‘under attack’ in every corner of the globe, UN warns

Mediapart had almost 220,000 subscribers in 2023, about 60,000 more than in 2022.

The turnover is €22.45 million (€21.23 million in 2022) and it reported a net profit of nearly €2.3 million (€2.6 million in 2022).

The company has 137 employees, including 65 journalists.

Mediapart says it is able to guarantee independence thanks to the fact that it relies only subscriptions and secured capital since 2019.

According to Fouteau, in its 16 years of existence, the left-leaning website “has established itself as an indispensable power” thanks to its investigations of political scandals, police violence, or sexual violence.

(With newswires)

Secretary of State Blinken said Wednesday that President Ruto confirmed plans to send a Kenyan-led security mission to Haiti and expected progress in the coming days on a transitional council, although any moves towards finding political consensus in Porte-au-Prince appear to have failed.

Kenya has offered to lead a security mission – largely funded by the United States and Canada – to violence-ravaged Haiti but said the mission was on hold after Haitian Prime Minister Ariel Henry resigned on Monday in a deal pushed by Caribbean leaders and the United States.

• UN warns of increasing gang violence in Haiti amid calls for Kenya-led peace mission

Confirming an account by Ruto, Blinken said he spoke to the Kenyan leader by telephone and discussed a transitional council that was being formed to name a new prime minister ahead of elections.

Ruto “confirmed Kenya’s preparedness to lead that mission just as soon as this new council is stood up – which we believe will happen in the next couple of days – and an interim president is elected,” Blinken said.

Blinken acknowledged the challenges ahead for Haiti, where public order has broken down and armed gangs control most of the capital.

No agreement on transition plan

However, the proposal to install new leadership in Haiti appeared to be crumbling by Wednesday evening, as some political parties rejected the plan to create a presidential council that would manage the transition.

The plan entails the creation of a panel that would be responsible for selecting an interim prime minister and a council of ministers that would attempt to chart a new path for the country that has been overrun by criminal gangs.

The violence has closed schools and businesses and disrupted daily life across the Caribbean nation, leaving dozens dead.

• Africa-led mission to Haiti ‘urgently needed’, according to the UN

Jean Charles Moïse, an ex-senator and presidential candidate who has teamed up with former rebel leader Guy Philippe, held a news conference Wednesday to announce his rejection of the proposed council backed by the international community.

Moïse has insisted that a three-person presidential council he recently created with Philippe and a Haitian judge should be implemented.

His ally, Philippe, who helped lead a successful revolt in 2004 against former President Jean-Bertrand Aristide and was recently released from a United States prison after pleading guilty to money laundering, said no Haitian should accept any proposal from the international community.

Philippe accused the international community of being complicit with Haiti’s elite and corrupt politicians and urged Haitians to take to the streets.

Other high-profile Haitian politicians also declined to participate in the proposed transitional council.

Haitian PM in exile

Caribbean leaders who announced the plan for the transitional council have not yet responded to the impasse.

The transition proposal emerged late Monday, following a meeting involving Caribbean leaders, US Secretary of State Blinken and others who are searching for a solution to halt Haiti’s violence.

Hours after the meeting, Henry announced Tuesday that he would resign once the council was in place, saying that his government “cannot remain insensitive to this situation.”

Henry remains locked out of Haiti because gang attacks have shuttered the country’s airports.

He is currently in Puerto Rico.

The student, a member of the Union of Jewish Students in France (UEJF) was met with shouts of “Don’t let her in, she’s a Zionist”, the union said on X.

The incident sparked condemnation at the highest level of government, with Macron telling Wednesday’s cabinet meeting that the remarks were “unspeakable and perfectly intolerable”.

Around a hundred students occupied the main amphitheatre of France’s most prestigious school of political science on Tuesday, as part of a “European university mobilisation day for Palestine”.

According to a student present in the amphitheatre, interviewed by French news agency AFP, the young woman member of the UEJF was prevented from entering “for security reasons, because she had previously intimidated pro-Palestinian students”.

“She is the only one who could not enter. Other members of the UEJF attended the debates,” she said, speaking anonymously.

“UEJF students are targeted as Jews and Zionists,” the Jewish student association denounced on X, while the president of the Representative Council of Jewish Institutions in France (Crif), Yonathan Arfi, deplored an “atmosphere of antisemitism”.

Disciplinary action

Sciences Po‘s management announced that it would take disciplinary action, informing AFP “that several red lines have been crossed”.

The management said it regretted a “hardening” of relations between students and the “embedding of an unacceptable poisonous climate”.

Prime Minister Gabriel Attal and Higher Education Minister Sylvie Retailleau went to the Sciences Po Foundation’s board to “underline the seriousness” of what happened and urged the university to remain a “place of teaching” and “healthy debates”, its management said.

Government spokesperson Prisca Thevenot said that President Macron had clarified and firmly reiterated his position: “academic institutions are autonomous, but this autonomy does not justify any form of separatism,” she said.

But students on the ground said the government should be more circumspect in its condemnation.

“It’s really sad that unverified information is taken directly to the French president,” said one student who declined to be named. “We don’t tolerate any form of anti-Semitism.”

• Anti-Semitism in France ‘quadrupled’ on back of Israel-Hamas war

• Macron says recognition of Palestinian state ‘not a taboo’ for France

The protests attracted praise from left-wing politicians like France Unbowed (LFI) MP Aymeric Caron who wrote on X: “bravo to the students of Sciences Po who are mobilised against the ongoing genocide in Gaza”.

LFI candidate in the European elections Rima Hassan also expressed her “support to all students and faculties mobilising against the ongoing genocide” on Tuesday.

France has seen a rise in pro-Palestinian protests since militant group Hamas attacked Israel on 7 October, sparking a retaliatory Israeli military campaign in the besieged Palestinian territory of Gaza.

At least 31,341 people have been killed during more than five months of war, according to the health ministry in the Hamas-run territory.

(With newswires)

The move provides a welcome boost for Kyiv as support from its other major backer, the United States, wavers and its outgunned forces struggle to hold back Russia.

Belgium, which holds the EU’s rotating presidency, said ambassadors from the bloc’s 27 nations had agreed “in principle” on the plan to support arms supplies to Kyiv in 2024 with five billion euros.

In the wake of Moscow’s 2022 invasion, the European Union for the first time agreed to fund weapons deliveries to a country at war.

Since then it has committed €6.1 billion from its centralmainly to reimburse part of the cost of arms sent by member states to Ukraine.

The push to bolster the EU fund by an extra €five billion was delayed for months amid wrangling from Germany and France.

But according to Politico, “a big chunk of the contributions to the Fund will not actually be in the form of new cash.

“In fact,” the magazine writes, “EU countries can discount their bilateral weapons shipments as “contributions” to the fund. Germany has already said that it won’t pay €1.2 billion but will instead count its own arms shipments as its contribution.”

Compromise

Berlin insisted its bilateral support for Ukraine should be offset against its contribution, and Paris demanded that only weapons produced in Europe should be reimbursed.

Diplomats said Germany, the largest contributor to the fund, had struck a compromise with Brussels to offset a percentage of its own bilateral support against the fund.

They said France was also satisfied by a commitment that countries would prioritise purchases from European defence firms, but could look outside the EU if certain ammunition or systems were not readily available.

• France is world’s second biggest arms exporter, just ahead of Russia: report

Overall since the Kremlin unleashed its war, Brussels says around 28 billion euros have been spent from member states and EU coffers to support Ukraine’s military.

Ukraine’s Prime Minister Denys Shmygal welcomed the additional money.

“Thank you Josep Borrell for your unwavering support to Ukraine on the road to victory,” he posted on X, referring to the EU’s foreign affairs chief.

On Thursday evening at 20:00, France’s President Emmanuel Macron will talk on national television about France’s role in supporting Ukraine, after the French parliament voted in favor of his Ukraine strategy earlier this week.

(With newswires)

For 55 days, starting 17 March 2022, French citizens were confined to their homes as part of the government’s approach to controlling the then little-understood virus sweeping the planet, which we now know as Covid-19. Historian Nicolas Mariot, co-author of a book about the lockdown, looks into the reasons behind why a majority of people in France accepted the harsh curbs on personal freedom, and asks why there has not been a broader reckoning about the impacts. (Listen @ 2’40) 

Vasectomies are rare in France. The procedure that cuts the tubes in men’s testicles that carry sperm, serving as a permanent form of birth control, was only legalised in 2001. Urologist Vincent Hupertan describes the reservations patients and doctors have about the vasectomies, which have to do with both French culture and how the health system works. And we hear from one man before and after his vasectomy, who was told by his doctor to rethink it in case he ever planned to remarry a younger woman. (Listen @ 17’00)

Rosa Bonheur, born 16 March 1822, was probably the best-known female painter of the 19th century. Writer Anna Polonyi talks about how Bonheur’s paintings of animals are attracting fresh interest from people curious about her personal life, notably her decades-long relationship with a woman. Yet some of the people in charge of guarding her legacy refuse to say that she was lesbian. Polonyi’s web documentary series, The Rosa Bonheur Case, explores Bonheur’s life and how queer artists are represented. (Listen @ 10’15)

Episode mixed by Cecile Pompéani. 

Spotlight on France is a podcast from Radio France International. Find us on rfienglish.com, Apple podcasts (link here), Spotify (link here) or your favourite podcast app (pod.link/1573769878).

Hubert Fournier, who heads the French football federation’s, national technical department last month called for more structure in the preparations for the sessions.

During an interview with the French broadcaster RMC Sport, Fournier suggested that Deschamps and other France national team coaches should organise scenarios which helped the players prepare for the intensity of the shoot-outs.

“He ought to offer them a range of exercises that will allow the players taking the kicks to gain more confidence,” Fournier said.

But announcing his 23-man squad for the friendlies against Germany and Chile on 23 and 26 March respectively, Deschamps launched a six-minute tirade about Fournier’s proposals.

“I find the comments inappropriate and I would even say disrespectful,” said Deschamps. “It’s not just about me but about all coaches.”

Fournier’s suggestions come as Deschamps fine-tunes his team preparations for the European championships in June and July in Germany.

For the matches in Lyon and Marseille, Deschamps has drafted in Aston Villa’s Moussa Diaby to vie for a place among a forward line including skipper Kylian Mbappé and the veteran strikers Olivier Giroud and Antoine Griezmann who were part of the team that won the 2018 World Cup.

Defenders Benjamin Pavard and Aurélien Tchouaméni have been recalled. The duo missed the qualifying matches last November against Gibraltar and Greece due to injury.

The French – who lost the 2022 World Cup final in a penalty shoot-out – go into the European championships as one of the favourites.

Status

They lie second in the Fifa rankings behind Argentina and ahead of England and Belgium.

“The shoot-out is a confrontation between the goalkeeper and the person taking the penalty,” added Deschamps who skippered France to the World Cup title in 1998 as well as the the European championships crown in 2000. 

Deschamps, who is only one of three men to have won the World Cup as a player and as a coach, added: “It’s not that I don’t think that these things can be worked on but I am convinced – and my time as a player informs me on this point – that it is impossible to recreate the psychological conditions of a shoot-out while you are in a training session.”

For the matches in Chateauroux and Sochaux, Deschamps has drafted in Aston Villa’s Moussa Diaby to vie for a place among the forwards while defenders Benjamin Pavard and Aurélien Tchouaméni have been recalled. The duo  missed the qualifying matches last November against Gibraltar and Greece due to injury.

The legislation, backed in a vote by 464 EU lawmakers, with 92 against and 65 abstaining, also enshrines editorial independence and seeks to improve transparency on media ownership.

The law still needs to be adopted by the EU’s 27 member countries before it can come into force.

The law includes protections for the secrecy of journalists’s sources and a ban on using spyware against journalists.

The European Union commissioner for values and transparency, Vera Jourova, hailed the “historic vote”, saying on X that “independent media are essential to democracies” and “it’s the duty of democracies to protect them”.

Reporters Without Borders (RSF), a French media watchdog advocating journalist safety and independence, welcomed the move.

“This law’s adoption marks a major step forward for the right to information within the European Union,” said RSF’s Brussels office chief Julie Majerczak.

She called for EU member countries to “ambitiously” implement the law.

• Tough talks ahead of EU media freedom law as France insists on use of spyware

The draft text of the European Media Freedom Act was introduced by the European Commission in 2022 in reaction to deteriorating media pluralism and independence in EU countries such as Hungary and Poland, and also as spyware like Pegasus and Predator was being used to target journalists.

Jourova said in a Tuesday debate on the law in the European Parliament in Strasbourg ahead of the vote that its provisions address “clear problems” facing media in Europe.

Those included “interference by governments in editorial decisions, pressure on media of public service, media surveillance of journalists, lack of transparency of media ownership and of state advertising, or lack of coordination among media regulators”.

Limited exceptions

During negotiations on the new law, France insisted on “national security” carve-outs, sparking concerns among journalists and media-freedom organisations.

Exceptions are included in the final law, but not for national security reasons, and only in limited circumstances.

For instance, spyware on devices used by journalists can only be deployed if a number of serious violations are identified, and then only after sign-off from a judicial or independent authority.

EU countries will also be required to ensure sustainable financing of public media organisations, and there are safeguards for journalistic content published online.

The legislation contains provisions for setting up an independent EU committee composed of representatives from national regulatory authorities to examine cases where overconcentration of media ownership might infringe the rules.

The panel would issue recommendations – nonbinding ones – in regards to media pluralism.

(with AFP)

Dutch media outlet RTL Nieuws, quoting “informed sources” reported that France’s Naval Group is likely to be the one to replace the thirty-year old Walrus class fleet of Dutch subs, beating rivals Saab from Sweden and Germany’s Thyssen-Krupp Marine Systems (TKMS.)

Saab would have partnered with Dutch Damen Shipyards, while Naval cooperates with shipbuilder Royal IHC, another Dutch constructor.

Dutch submarines

According to Jaime Karremann, editor of Dutch navy monitor portal Marineschepen.nl, the Dutch navy has three submarines which all entered service in the early 1990s. A fourth sub was retired in December last year. 

“They are ageing. They really need replacement. That should have happened a long time ago,” he told RFI.

“They are not primarily used for coastal defence,” he says, “but rather deployed far from home, in the Atlantic, the Caribbean or the Persian Gulf.” 

“They collect intelligence and can be used to drop special forces.

Some fifteen years ago, the Dutch weren’t convinced that they wanted to replace the vessels at all.

“Until 2013, it wasn’t clear if we shouldn’t get rid of them altogether, like in Denmark,” says Karremann.

But since 2014, the year Russia invaded Crimea, things have changed when expenditure started to gradually rise. “It accelerated over the last couple of years,” he says, “meaning that there’s more space in the budget for submarines.”

Criticism

According to an article by the Telegraaf newspaper on 28 February, which first reported about the possibility of Naval getting the deal, the Dutch navy wants to replace their old fleet with four Barracuda-class submarines at a total cost of up to €6 billion.

The news, however,  triggered a furious response from critics in the Dutch parliament who say that the French company has an unfair advantage over Dutch rivals, as “the Naval Group shipyard, owned by the [French] state, can take larger risks and deliver for prices a commercial wharf can barely compete with,” according to De Telegraaf. A parliamentary debate this Thursday could modify the result.

For France, there is more at stake. “The submarine dossier is high on the agenda” in Paris, says Karremann, pointing to the mega-deal that went south last year.

In 2023, Naval thought it had a massive €31 billion deal with Australia for the construction and sale of twelve conventional subs. But at the last moment, Australia joined forces with the US and the UK in the “Aukus” deal, which included the sale of nuclear fueled ships to Canberra, manufactured in the US and the UK.

• Sinking of submarine deal leaves Franco-US friendship in tatters

According to a research briefing by the British House of Commons, Australia will still have to wait a while before the subs are ready to sail as they “will be built in the UK and Australia and work will begin by 2030, with a view to entering service…[in]the early 2040s.”

Meanwhile, the document says, Australia will use three Virginia-class submarines which it buys from the US, “with potential for the sale of a further two.”

Mathias Vicherat, director of the prestigious Sciences Po school in Paris, became the target of angry protests by students demanding his resignation after he and his partner Anissa Bonnefont were briefly detained in December, each accusing the other of domestic violence.

“I have been informed that my ex-partner and myself have been ordered to stand trial in a criminal court,” Vicherat, 45, said in a message sent to faculty Wednesday.

His resignation was to “protect” the school from any fallout of the case, he said. “What counts here is not me but the institution,” he said.

Accusations of violence against him had been made in a “vague manner” Vicherat said, and the judiciary would “allow the facts to be established”.

No legal complaint

The criminal case was brought by prosecutors, neither Vicherat nor his former partner having filed any legal complaint against each other.

The Paris prosecutors’ office confirmed that a summons had been delivered to both Vicherat and his ex-partner, on charges of reciprocal domestic violence “leading to an incapacity to work of more than eight days”.

The case will go to trial in the autumn, added a source close to the investigation who asked not to be named.

Vicherat had already stood down temporarily in January after a preliminary investigation was launched and students blockaded the school, protesting against what they said was “impunity” for people committing “sexual and sexist violence”.

Domestic violence

He insisted that he had never committed any acts of domestic violence, but acknowledged that “trust may have been damaged.”

Sciences Po, founded in 1872, is a hugely influential cornerstone of French elite education. Its list of alumni features leading politicians including President Emmanuel Macron and several former French and foreign leaders, as well as top names in literature, media, culture and fashion.

Its reputation was already tarnished when Vicherat’s predecessor Frederic Mion was accused of covering up incest allegations against star political scientist Olivier Duhamel, who was head of the Sciences Po Foundation that has strategic oversight over the university.

• Head of prestigious Sciences Po university resigns amidst incest scandal

After Mion resigned, Vicherat took over, saying the fight against sexual violence was an “absolute priority.”

Sciences Po’s management said on Wednesday that a new leadership team would be put together in the coming days.

(with AFP)

A new EU study has stated that Europe could suffer “catastrophic” consequences from climate change if it fails to take urgent and decisive action to adapt to risks.

The massive, 425-page European Climate Risk Assessment (Eucra) is the first of its kind and identifies 36 climate dangers – including fires, water shortages and their effects on agricultural production – while low-lying coastal regions face threats of flooding, erosion and saltwater intrusion.

“Many of these risks have already reached critical levels and could become catastrophic without urgent and decisive action,” according to the report.

“Eucra identifies three hotspot regions,” Julie Berckmans, a European climate risk expert with the European Environment Agency (EEA) told RFI. These include:

1. Southern Europe

Southern Europe, faces increasing heat and droughts – affecting outdoor workers in the agricultural sector – and tourism, which is hit by brutal wildfires in forest areas.

2. Low-lying coastal regions

Low-lying coastal regions may face flooding and coastal erosion, “especially due to sea level rise,” she says, while a third “hotspot” is identified in the “outermost regions” of the EU, which face particular risk because they are isolated and have weak infrastructure.

3. Outermost regions

“The extreme heat, drought, wildfires, and flooding – as experienced in recent years – will worsen in Europe even under optimistic global warming scenarios and affect living conditions throughout the continent,” the EEA warned.

• Hottest February ever puts world in ‘unchartered’ climate territory

Fastest warming continent in the world

According to Eucra, 2023 was the warmest year on record, and the average global temperature in the 12-month period between February 2023 and January 2024 “exceeded pre-industrial levels by 1.5C.

” Europe,” the report says, “is the fastest-warming continent in the world.”

“We used data from the Copernicus climate change service,” says Berckmans, which shows that “Europe is warming twice as fast at the global average.

“The Arctic is warming even faster,” she says, adding “it is also losing a lot of snow, a lot of ice cover.”

• Europe on alert as severe drought hits food, energy production

She adds that changing ocean currents are affecting Europe’s climate, while thermal warming and the increased number of heat waves on the continent are driven by air circulation patterns in the atmosphere, which cause more stable, yet hotter weather conditions.

But climate warriors face an uphill battle.

Europe-wide farmer protests  demonstrate unhappiness about increasingly tight environmental regulations, and this may slow down the EU decision making process on climate change.

“It is important to acknowledge these concerns,” says Berckmans. “We also need to remember that people have diverse needs and means to deal with the change. 

“It’s very critical to consider social justice,” but she points out that it is the agricultural sector which is at high risk due to climate change.

• Global warming threshold of 1.5°C will be broken within 7 years, research shows

Final wake-up call?

Meanwhile, France’s Cour des Comptes (State Audit Court) recently published its yearly assessment for 2024, focusing on climate change.

The 725-page report echoes the concerns of Eucra, pointing out that generally climate change-induced health risk is “still insufficiently controlled,” housing is not protected enough against heat, flooding and drought.

It added that cities adaptation to climate change has come “too late”.

The report adds that France’s rail network is too vulnerable to weather events, the protection of French coasts is insufficient against floods, and nuclear power plants – France’s major source of energy– and electricity transmission networks are too fragile in the face of the increasingly volatile weather conditions.

In general, says Berckmans, EU member states don’t do enough.

“Policy readiness is low, meaning that the will to adapt is low,” while climate action of different EU states lacks coherence.

“Many of the risks are co-owned,” she says, “so there is shared responsibility between the EU and member states.”

Eucra’s report serves as a “wake-up call,” she says, as decades of discussion about global warming and climate change has led to “climate fatigue” among a larger public, but “there is a strong need to make this call.

“There is no scenario where we cannot do anything. There is only one scenario: to act now. And this really is the final wake-up call,” she concludes.

According to Philippe de Gaulle’s son, Yves: “He died on Tuesday night at the Institution Nationale des Invalides, where he had been a resident for two years.”

“We salute the memory of a formidable father and a great Frenchman, whose sense of duty was equalled only by his elegance and modesty.

“Vision, honour and simplicity – that is what Gaullism is all about”, wrote Pierre de Gaulle, another of the admiral’s sons, on social media.

• Last remaining French D-day veteran Léon Gautier dies at 100
• A man of inspiration: France honours Charles de Gaulle 50 years after death

Illustrious career

Born on 28 December 1921 in Paris, Philippe de Gaulle – a former student of the Ecole Navale – joined the Free French Naval Forces in 1940.

As an ensign, he took part in campaigns in the North Atlantic until 1944, then in the liberation of France from 1944 to 1945 as part of the Leclerc division.

De Gaulle was promoted to lieutenant in 1948, corvette captain in 1956 and finally admiral in 1980. He ended his military career two years later. 

The eldest of Charles de Gaulle’s three children, Philippe went on to become a senator for Paris between 1986 and 2004, for the centre-right RPR and UMP parties.

He devoted himself to preserving the memory of his father, publishing several works on the General, including the best-selling De Gaulle, mon père. 

For a “dazzled son”, as he put it, the aim his best-seller was to humanise his illustrious father – an icon during his lifetime, leader of Free France and former President of the Republic – who died in 1970. 

Following a tense debate, the National Assembly lower house held a non-binding vote on the government’s strategy including a bilateral security agreement signed by Macron and Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky last month.

Lawmakers eventually backed the pact by a wide margin, with 372 votes in favour and 99 against, while 101 abstained.

The far-right National Rally (RN), which leads Macron’s alliance by a wide margin ahead of the June European elections, abstained, while the far-left France Unbowed party (LFI) voted against it, as expected.

While the vote is symbolic, it gave political parties an opportunity to publicly express their positions in relation to Macron’s strategy on the conflict as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine stretches into its third year.

A major hot-button topic

The 10-year security pact with Ukraine includes commitments by Paris to deliver more arms, train soldiers and send up to €3 billion in military aid to Ukraine in 2024.

Macron has also adopted a tougher stance towards Russia, urging Ukraine’s allies to urgently do more. He also did not rule out the presence of Western troops in Ukraine which has created a backlash.

Ukrainian officials had told Reuters they were worried that a vote not overwhelmingly in favour of Kyiv would be negative symbolically and could hurt Macron’s efforts to ramp up his country’s support in the coming months.

Earlier on Tuesday, LFI leader Manuel Bompard told LCI channel that the vote in Parliament on support for Ukraine had “a masquerade dimension”. “This agreement has already been ratified by the President, it is not a binding vote”, he said.

• EU leaders reject Macron’s suggestion that sending troops to Ukraine is possible

Jordan Bardella, the 28-year-old leader of the RN, said his party would abstain because of its “red lines”.

“We need to be very careful”, said Bardella. “Yes to support for Ukraine, but no to war with Russia.”

The RN opposes the dispatch of Western ground troops and the possibility of Ukraine becoming a member of NATO and the EU.

In France’s polarised political landscape, Russia’s war against Ukraine has emerged as a major hot-button topic.

Macron has been seeking to hammer home the importance of greater support for Ukraine, which is running out of ammunition, insisting that Europe’s security is at stake.

French ground troops

Allies of Macron at the weekend lambasted the far-right National Rally at the launch of their European election campaign, accusing them of betraying the interests of France and Europe and flirting with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Speaking to French broadcaster BFM TV on Monday, Zelensky said that there was no need for French ground troops in his war-torn country as long as “Ukraine holds”.

“Your children are not going to die in Ukraine,” he said.

The Senate upper house was set to hold similar debates on Wednesday.

(with newswires)

For 55 days, starting 17 March 2022, French citizens were confined to their homes as part of the government’s approach to controlling the then little-understood virus sweeping the planet, which we now know as Covid-19. Historian Nicolas Mariot, co-author of a book about the lockdown, looks into the reasons behind why a majority of people in France accepted the harsh curbs on personal freedom, and asks why there has not been a broader reckoning about the impacts. (Listen @ 2’40) 

Vasectomies are rare in France. The procedure that cuts the tubes in men’s testicles that carry sperm, serving as a permanent form of birth control, was only legalised in 2001. Urologist Vincent Hupertan describes the reservations patients and doctors have about the vasectomies, which have to do with both French culture and how the health system works. And we hear from one man before and after his vasectomy, who was told by his doctor to rethink it in case he ever planned to remarry a younger woman. (Listen @ 17’00)

Rosa Bonheur, born 16 March 1822, was probably the best-known female painter of the 19th century. Writer Anna Polonyi talks about how Bonheur’s paintings of animals are attracting fresh interest from people curious about her personal life, notably her decades-long relationship with a woman. Yet some of the people in charge of guarding her legacy refuse to say that she was lesbian. Polonyi’s web documentary series, The Rosa Bonheur Case, explores Bonheur’s life and how queer artists are represented. (Listen @ 10’15)

Episode mixed by Cecile Pompéani. 

Spotlight on France is a podcast from Radio France International. Find us on rfienglish.com, Apple podcasts (link here), Spotify (link here) or your favourite podcast app (pod.link/1573769878).

This month, Somalia’s parliament ratified an agreement with Turkey to provide naval protection and assistance in building a Somali navy, another step in Turkey’s efforts to expand its African presence.

“With this pact, Turkey will protect the Somali coast from pirates, terrorists – anyone that violates our maritime borders, like Ethiopia,” declared Abdifatah Kasim, Somalia’s deputy defence minister. 

The defence deal was followed by a bilateral agreement on energy exploration in Somalia.

Ankara’s growing influence in the region was underscored by a strong African presence at Turkey’s annual Antalya Diplomacy Forum, with seven African heads of state, seven prime ministers and 25 foreign ministers in attendance.

In January, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni hosted African leaders at a summit in Rome, where she unveiled plans to expand Italy’s influence on the continent.

“Our future inevitably depends on the future of the African continent. We are aware of this, and we want to do our part,” Meloni declared.

“That’s why we have decided to launch an ambitious programme of interventions that can help the continent grow and prosper, starting from its immense resources.”

• Italy targets energy, migration with ‘non-predatory’ plan for Africa

Common ground in Libya

Analysts say both countries are considering cooperating as a means of achieving their Africa goals.

“Italy is trying to fulfil a position that Western countries in some way left over the last decades, while Turkey has already been in Africa and in sub-Saharan Africa,” observes Alessia Chiriatti of the Institute of International Affairs, an Italian think tank.

“The main issues for confrontation or cooperation – we will see – will be migration, energy issues, and, of course, the economic development of these countries,” she says.

Also in January, Meloni met Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Istanbul. The meeting included talks on Africa, with a focus on cooperation in Libya – a country where experts say Ankara has considerable influence, including a military base.

The North African nation is a main transit route for migrants seeking to enter Europe, mainly through Italy.

• Tunisia brush-off augurs badly for EU push for African migration deals

Italy, France and other European countries see that as a “huge threat”, according to Elem Eyrice-Tepeciklioglu of the African Studies Department at Ankara’s Social Sciences University.

“So there is room to cooperate in this area and to prevent the illegal flow of migrants, and cooperate in the security area as well.”

On Tuesday, the Italian and Turkish defence ministers held talks in Ankara. Exploiting Libya’s vast energy reserves is also potential common ground.

France on the outs

Meanwhile the recent ousting of regimes sympathetic to France in Niger, Mali and Gabon – and with it, the withdrawal of French forces – has severely weakened France’s historical political and economic influence in West Africa.

That offers an opportunity to Italy and Turkey.

“Italy could have an important cooperation with Turkey in order to take advantage of the position left aside by some countries like France, like Germany, like the other Western countries in Africa,” says analyst Chiriatti.

“But it will also depend on the bilateral agenda and bilateral interests expressed by Turkey and Italy,” she adds. “That’s not always the same. So in this sense, we need to see what will happen in the future step by step.”

• Newly reconciled, Turkey and Egypt could be a force for stability in Africa

Business opportunities

Chiriatti warns that cooperation can easily turn into rivalry in business. But Africa’s vast economic potential is seen as offering plenty of room for partnership.

“There are several areas where Turkey can cooperate with other countries, including European countries, because Turkish companies are trying to increase their investments,” says Eyrice-Tepeciklioglu.

“They would like to gain new contracts for large projects, et cetra. Africa is in desperate need of infrastructure. There’s a huge energy deficit and infrastructure gap in the whole continent,” she notes.

With Italy and Turkey lacking the financial muscle of other influential players on the continent – notably China – both countries have powerful incentives to focus on potential partnership in their bid to expand their influence in Africa.

Turkish security forces have detained hundreds of suspects in the aftermath of January’s deadly attack on Santa Maria Catholic Church in the Sariyer district, which killed one person.

The death toll could have been considerably higher if the gunmen’s automatic weapons had not jammed.

The Islamic State group claimed responsibility in a statement that warned it was targeting Jews and Christians in Turkey. 

Istanbul’s small Christian community, although fearful, remains defiant.

“It’s not necessary to be a member of the congregation to be frightened. It’s something that would terrify anyone,” declared Ilhan Guzelis after attending his local church service.

“We’re scared, but believe me, we’ve never hesitated to come to our church, to worship here, and to pray to God.”

Game of cat and mouse

Two men, a Russian and a Tajik national, have been arrested for carrying out the attack, while over a hundred others have been detained across the country.  

Experts say Turkish security forces are now engaged in a deadly cat-and-mouse game with the terror group also known as Isis or Daesh. 

“This is a mutual competition between the security forces and terrorist cells,” Murat Aslan of the Ankara-based Foundation for Political, Economic and Social Research (Seta) told RFI.

“Both sides will try to identify or deceive each other. And in this case, I believe the Daesh terrorists were skilful, at least to bypass the security measures.”

Aslan warns the job is becoming harder for Turkey’s security forces as the face of Islamic State evolves. He cites changes to assailants’ personal appearance, for example: recent attackers have worn regular clothes and shaved their beards, which helps them blend into a crowd.

“They are regular citizens. So it’s not that much easier to distinguish exactly who is radical or not, for instance. In the latest incident in the church, the individuals were like regular citizens,” he said.

Turkish targets

Adding to security woes is the proximity of Turkey to Syrian territory once held by Islamic State and other radical jihadist groups.

“There are armed groups in Turkey. They still have baggage in Turkey, the remnants of the armed groups inside Turkey, even Isis remnants back from the Syrian war,” claims Sezin Oney of the Politikyol news portal.

The last time Islamic State successfully carried out a major attack in Turkey was in 2017, when a gunman went on the rampage during New Year celebrations, killing 39 people at an Istanbul nightclub.

But Aslan warns that Turkey offers numerous targets.

“The church attack was really significant in terms of the potential of Daesh,” he says.

“Turkey hosts a lot of churches and Jewish holy sites. Once [terrorists] enjoy a presence here and set up hidden cells, they can easily select a target.”

Fears for tourist season

With Turkey‘s lucrative tourism season only a month or so away, bringing with it further potential targets for Islamic State, the government security crackdown is predicted to intensify.

Christians like Guzelis have mixed feelings over the presence of such patrols around the city’s churches.

“After such an incident, it is good for us that [the police] come here to protect us here again, even as a presence; we are grateful for this,” he says.

“I wish that there would be no such matters, that everyone would live together here as brothers and sisters. But we are sorry for what happened; it creates a bitterness in us.”

Read also:

• As Turkey bombards Kurdish forces in Syria, is the US preparing to pull out?
• With spy raids, Turkey warns Israel not to seek Hamas revenge on Turkish soil

Hello everyone! Welcome to The Sound Kitchen weekly podcast, published every Saturday. This week, you’ll hear musical requests from your fellow listeners Sultan Mahmud from Naogaon, Bangladesh, Hossen Abed Ali from Rangpur, Bangladesh, and Jayanta Chakrabarty from New Delhi, India.

Be sure you send in your music requests! Write to me at thesoundkitchen@rfi.fr

Here’s the music you heard on this week’s programme: “Prezident oldida qo’shiq kuyladi” by Mohisharifa Matchonova, performed by Aida; “Heart of Gold”, written and performed by Neil Young, and “Gypsy Queen” by Chris Norman, performed by Norman and Smokie.

The quiz will be back next Saturday, 9 March. Be sure and tune in! 

Seven years after the #MeToo movement shook Hollywood, Judith Godrèche and other actresses in France have broken the omertà around sexual abuse within the French movie industry, accusing several prominent directors of assault. Investigations are underway. Bérénice Hamidi, a specialist in the performing arts at Lyon University, talks about the extent to which this marks a turning point in French cinema culture, which for decades has fostered the idea that artists have “a free pass” to transgress the rules, and that the artist cannot be separated from his art. (Listen @0′)

With unrest still rumbling among farmers, France’s new culture minister says she wants people in rural areas to have more access to culture. A third of the French population lives in rural communities and Culture Minister Rachida Dati has launched a national consultation on schemes to serve them – schemes like the Cinémobile, a lorry that transforms into a cinema and visits small towns across central France. It’s been running for more than 40 years and despite entertainment being easier than ever to find online, something about the mobile movie theatre keeps audiences coming back. (Listen @18’08)

French administration has not always made it easy for people born on 29 February – a date that occurs just once every four years. But the satirical Bougie du sapeur newspaper has embraced and indeed lives for the date. Founded in 1980, its previous edition was on 29 February 2020. Editor Jean d’Indy talks about using humour to look at the news of the past four years in this year’s edition. (Listen @12′)

Episode mixed by Cecile Pompéani. 

Spotlight on France is a podcast from Radio France International. Find us on rfienglish.com, Apple podcasts (link here), Spotify (link here) or your favourite podcast app (pod.link/1573769878).

Ankara was kicked out of the jet program after it purchased Russian S-400 anti-aircraft missiles, which Washington said compromised the F-35’s stealth technology.

Now Turkey’s purchase of the advanced F-35 military jet could be back on the agenda.

Acting deputy of Secretary of State Victoria Nuland, during a visit to Istanbul last month, offered to revive the jet sale if the Russian missiles were removed.

Along with the $2.5 billion (€2.3 billion) price tag for the Russian missiles, Ankara paid a heavy price militarily and economically by being expelled from the F-35 program.

Founding partner

Turkey was one of the founding partners of the jet program, with Turkish companies building numerous parts for the plane.

Diplomatically the missile sale created a deep divide between Turkey and its NATO partners, raising questions over its allegiance to the Western military alliance.

“After the purchase of the anti-aircraft missiles, which was unprecedented, some people in [President] Erdogan’s cabinet also admitted this was a big mistake,” says Onur Isci, a Russian affairs expert at Istanbul’s Kadir Has University told RFI.

“Turkey’s purchase of the S-400s was a very costly endeavor.”

• The escaping Russians finding a better life in Turkey

The S-400 missile sale was a powerful symbol of deepening Russian Turkish ties and deteriorating relations with Washington.

The sale came in the aftermath of Ankara’s accusations of Washington’s involvement in the 2016 failed coup attempt against Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Russian President Vladimir Putin was among the first leaders to offer Erdogan support during the attempted putsch.

Important symbol

While the Russian missiles sit in a warehouse undeployed, they remain an important symbol of Erdogan’s close ties to Putin, making their removal difficult for the Turkish president.

“The buying of the S-400 air defence system from Russia was a diplomatic catastrophe of historical magnitude,” says former senior Turkish diplomat Aydin Selcen, now a regional analyst.

“Unfortunately, it is not possible. I am led to believe that Erdogan will walk back from that mistake … It was an unforced error. It was an own goal, whichever metaphor you like.”

• Turkey’s bid to join EU back on the table at upcoming summit

However, US-Turkish ties are improving with Ankara’s ratification of Sweden’s NATO membership and Washington’s reciprocating by allowing the sale of F16 jets to Turkey.

But the F16 is inferior to the F35, which neighbor and rival Greece is set to purchase as part of its military modernisation, causing alarm in Ankara.

“When you read Turkey’s hawks, everybody is afraid that the air force balance over the Aegean is not tilting or is going to be tilting in favor of Greece,” warns Soli Ozel, who teaches international relations at Istanbul’s Kadir Has University. 

Waiting game

Whether Ankara takes up Washington’s offer of F-35 jets in exchange for removing the Russian-made missiles – possibly to a Turkish ally like Azerbaijan, Qatar, or even Libya – depends on the progress of improving relations with the United States.

“It’s very important if we see any more moves from Washington,” says Yoruk Isik, a geopolitical analyst in Istanbul with the Washington-based Middle East Institute. 

“The F35 was the first signal in years that that was a really positive signal from Washington. Ankara is waiting to hear the continuation of that message.”

Erdogan’s close ties with Putin have benefited Turkey in deferments on energy payments for Russian energy. The Turkish leader is predicted to be looking to Washington to pay a high price to remove the Russian weapons. 

“Turkey can easily renounce on S-400; it’s a political decision, it’s not a military necessity,” said Huseyin Bagci, head of the Foreign Policy Institute, a research organisation in Ankara.  

“So far, the S-400 has helped Turkey to increase the level of negotiations with NATO and the United States of America.”

Ankara’s purchase of Russian missiles was widely seen as a diplomatic triumph for Moscow, dividing Turkey from its NATO allies.

Their removal would be a similarly significant victory for Washington.

Madhya Pradesh is often referred to as the Heart of India. Located right in the middle of the country, the Indian region shows everything India has to offer through its abundant diversity. The IFTM trade show, which took place in Paris at the end of September, presented the perfect opportunity for travel enthusiasts to discover the region.

Sheo Shekhar Shukla, Managing Director of Madhya Pradesh’s tourism board, sat down to explain his approach to sustainable tourism.

“Post-covid the whole world has known a shift in their approach when it comes to tourism. And all those discerning travelers want to have different kinds of experiences: something offbeat, something new, something which has not been explored before.”

Through its UNESCO World Heritage Sites, Shukla wants to showcase the deep history Madhya Pradesh has to offer.

“UNESCO is very actively supporting us and three of our sites are already World Heritage Sites. Sanchi is a very famous buddhist spiritual destination, Bhimbetka is a place where prehistoric rock shelters are still preserved, and Khajuraho is home to thousand year old temples with magnificent architecture.”

All in all, Shukla believes that there’s only one way forward for the industry: “Travelers must take sustainable tourism as a paradigm in order to take tourism to the next level.”

In partnership with Madhya Pradesh’s tourism board.

Also known as the Land of the Beautiful Islands, Malaysia’s landscape and cultural diversity is almost unmatched on the planet. Those qualities were all put on display at the Malaysian stand during the IFTM trade show.

Libra Hanif, director of Tourism Malaysia, explained the appeal of the country as well as the importance of promoting sustainable tourism today: “Sustainable travel is a major trend now, with the changes that are happening post-covid. People want to get close to nature, to get close to people. So Malaysia being a multicultural and diverse [country] with a lot of natural environments, we felt that it’s a good thing for us to promote Malaysia.”

Malaysia has also gained fame in recent years, through its numerous UNESCO World Heritage Sites, which include Kinabalu Park and the Archaeological Heritage of the Lenggong Valley.

Green mobility has also become an integral part of tourism in Malaysia, with an increasing number of people using bikes to discover the country: “If you are a little more adventurous, we have the mountain back trails where you can cut across gazetted trails to see the natural attractions and the wildlife that we have in Malaysia,” says Hanif. “If you are not that adventurous, you’ll be looking for relaxing cycling. We also have countryside spots, where you can see all the scenery in a relaxing session.”

With more than 25,000 visitors at this IFTM trade show this year, Malaysia’s tourism board got to showcase the best the country and its people have to offer.

In partnership with Malaysia Tourism Promotion Board. For more information about Malaysia, click here.